


Dead Girl Walking

by DiceLyre



Category: Alien (Prequel Movies)
Genre: Other, fuck the writers, shaw deserved better, this is pure self-service
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-29
Updated: 2020-10-29
Packaged: 2021-03-09 02:13:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 554
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27267010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DiceLyre/pseuds/DiceLyre
Summary: It was not without understanding that Daniels asked Elizabeth, "You loved him, right?"
Comments: 1
Kudos: 9





	Dead Girl Walking

A/N: I abhorred the decision to kill off Elizabeth Shaw between _Prometheus_ and _Covenant,_ so this is an AU where Elizabeth survives to tell the tale. I wrote it mostly out of spite.

[The scene is set aboard the _Covenant_. Shaw got on the ship at the last possible moment, David is dead, and all xenomorph contamination has run its course.]

* * *

**DEAD GIRL WALKING**

It was finally, blissfully over. Elizabeth Shaw, Daniels, and Tennessee sat around a low table in the crew rec room, accompanied by a bottle of Jack Daniels and three empty glasses.

Daniels didn't realize she was speaking aloud until the words were hanging in the air. "I don't understand."

Shaw and Tennessee stirred, turned questioning gazes on the captain. Daniels stared beseechingly at Shaw, who steeled herself and cleared her throat.

"Which part?" Elizabeth asked, grief in her voice.

_In for a penny_ , Daniels thought. "We saw your body."

"My body?"

"You were lying on a table with your torso all...open."

"Open."

"It looked like a Caesarean."

Tennessee snorted. "Yeah, a C-section performed by Jack the Ripper, maybe."

Daniels cringed, but remained steadfast. "Explain that. Explain how the fuck you're sitting here right now when your corpse is rotting on the planet below."

Shaw had gone white, and she spoke with great bitterness.

"David was a genius by design, but he like to think he was an artist by choice."

Daniels noticed the strange derision in her voice, an acid kind of warmth. Shaw clearly hated David, but it was a hatred that claimed him. Tennessee clocked it too, thought of Farris, how they had claimed each other teasingly, lovingly; he thought of how cold his life was now.

Elizabeth went on. "He was always sketching. When we got here he started to make his own oil paints, eventually turned to sculpture...I knew him to start massive projects at dusk that were finished by the time I woke at dawn."

"It was covered in a lacquer, almost, a preservative," Daniels said. "I assumed it was to halt decomposition, but-"

Elizabeth shook her head.

"Not a body. That lacquer, it's a glaze he used to make from wood ash. For pottery."

It made sense, but Daniels had learned the hard way not to trust appearances. _Facts, Danny, stick to the facts_ , she thought.

"I saw it, and David knew I saw it. I asked him what he did to you, and he attacked me. He said he'd do the exact same thing to me."

"And what was that?"

Quiet. Then, "I don't know. He kissed me."

Elizabeth flinched. "I'm sorry for that."

"Walter saved me. He got David off, gave me time to run."

Daniels rubbed absently at her right side-her ribs were still healing from this latest assault in the airlock. Elizabeth sat very still, hand at her mouth, staring at nothing. They lapsed into silence for a long time.

When she eventually spoke, Elizabeth's voice rasped and cracked.

"It's hard. To hear how much he degraded."

She looked Daniels in the eyes. "I should have killed him a long time ago."

They sat quietly for a while more.

It was not without understanding that Daniels asked Elizabeth, "You loved him, right?"

Two minute, three, then-

"He was the only one there."

No one spoke after that.


End file.
